Duct tape and Bailing Wire

"Nope, I don't see anyway to get that power steering pump out of there either" said the wise old farmer who had a lifetime of working on Fords under his belt. Out of desperation I had made the call to my father in law in hopes that he would know of a trick of the trade that would free the broken power steering pump from the depths of the Escorts engine compartment. "But you know that Fords were made to be repaired with bailing wire" was the only advice he could muster. "I would just try and patch the pump" he said.

That is why I found myself under the hood with the broken hose connection, a glob of JB Weld, a piece of a tin can and a heat gun. No bailing wire. Trying to "glue" the parts of the pump back together while it was a balmy 20 degrees outside. It looked like it might even work. In fact just for luck I let the whole thing cure over night with company of a 60 watt light bulb to keep it warm. I thought my farmer father in law would be proud.

The next morning (day 3 of auto repair) I checked the status of the pump and it looked and felt good. I then installed the new alternator (a little grinding and it fit much easier than the old one), connected the power steering hoses and put the new belt on the alternator. It was going good.

Knowing that we needed to replenish the lost power steering fluid I sent AJ to the basement to retrieve the steering potion. Now, I thought our little repair job on the pump was suspect and it might not last forever but I thought it would probably work for a while. So we added the fluid to the power steering reservoir and watched it spill out of the pump and onto the ground. Seems as if the pump repair didn't go so well. Well who needs power steering anyway??

At least the new alternator is installed, so we fired up the car and I took off for a test drive. The car handled just fine without power steering though it squealed a bit if the wheels where turned hard in either direction. The CD player worked and it seemed the new alternator was working just fine. That was until about halfway through my test drive when the CD player quit and then the lights started to dim and it was looking real familiar.

I made it back to the driveway and I put a volt meter on the battery while the car was running and measured a whopping 7 volts. Not good. Also measured 7 volts at the alternator. The new alternator either was not working or had failed. I was not happy.

Now I could go on and on and probably already have so I will just say that by dark yesterday the car was on the road. It has a 2nd new alternator and a new battery and still no power steering. But I will say that I can now remove and replace an alternator on a 96 Ford Escort in less than an hour with no duct tape required. Maybe I should add that to my resume'?